Melbourne: Sania Mirza and Mahesh Bhupathi reached the semi-finals of the Australian Open mixed doubles event by beating Liezel Huber of USA and Colin Fleming of Great Britain in straight sets 7-6 (7-5), 6-2.
After being stretched in the opening set which went right down to the wire, the Indian pair asserted their supremacy in the second to win the 84-minute contest.
Earlier, Sania and her partner Elena Vesnina missed a great opportunity to make the women's doubles final when they went down to the Russian duo of Vera Zvonareva and Svetlana Kuznetsova.
Sania and Vesnina lost both the first and third sets after being in a commanding position and it was their 51 unforced errors that proved to be their undoing as they went down 6-7(4-7), 6-2, 4-6.
The Indo-Russian pair had opportunities to go 5-2 up in the decider, but erratic play cost them the match. They had also squandered a chance to wrap up the first set.
(With Agency inputs)
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